The
General Assembly approves Dag Hammarskjöld's proposal for OPEX, a
new type of assistance programme providing operational and executive personnel
to developing countries which he describes as "the complete antithesis
of anything in the nature of a colonial arrangement".

With his unanimous re-appointment for a second five-year term, the position
of the Secretary-General had been strengthened both from a political and
a constitutional point of view.

In several speeches and press conferences, Dag Hammarskjöld supported
the values of private diplomacy in peacemaking. On 5 February, he delivered
a speech at Ohio University, The Element
of Privacy in Peacemaking, where he urged greater recourse to quiet
diplomacy in the work of the United Nations. He also discussed the role
of the media in reporting world events:

"The media of mass communications, when supplemented
by education in world affairs in schools and universities, provide powerful
tools for developing a better informed public opinion. However, they can
also be misused. We learned between the First and Second World Wars that
public diplomacy could not in itself provide insurance of peace, for in
the hands of a ruthless group of rulers the mass media has been misused
to build strong public support for the wildest aspirations of these rulers
and thus to place an additional weapon in the hands of those who wanted
to lead the world in the direction of war, not peace.

Thus the mass media can be misused under certain circumstances for
harmful propaganda. Where competitive conditions prevail there is also
a tendency to play up conflict because conflict usually seems more dramatic
than agreement. For the same competitive reasons there is also the natural
desire to be "first with the story". In international affairs, this may
result in premature and often poorly informed publicity about an issue
at a time when the privacy of quiet diplomacy is essential to achieving
a constructive result. At the same time I recognize that public opinion
cannot be truly well informed about the progress of peacemaking unless
it understands the part that is played at all stages by private diplomacy
and its relationship to the public proceedings of parliamentary diplomacy
which are so fully reported. This creates difficulties both for the private
negotiator and the representatives of the mass media..."

On 10 April, Dag Hammarskjöld started his second term of office.
In an address to the staff, he quoted a Swedish song that culminates in
the words: "Will the day ever come when joy is great and sorrow is small?"
and went on to say:

Looking at it in terms of humanity, looking at
it in terms of the development of human society, it can be said, of course,
that what we are trying to do here is to make our small contribution, during
our short time, to a development which will finally lead us to the day
"when joy is great and sorrow is small."

However, you can also look at those words in a much more personal
and intimate sense. I think it is possible to interpret them superficially
but it is also possible to interpret them in a sense which goes to the
very heart of our way of settling our relation to life. And then I would
say that, on the day we feel that we are living with a duty, well fulfilled
and worth our while, on that day joy is great and we can look on sorrow
as being small."

On 22 May 1958, Lebanon asked for an urgent meeting of
the Security Council to consider the following item: "Complaint by Lebanon
in respect of a situation arising from the intervention of the United Arab
Republic in the internal affairs of Lebanon, the continuance of which is
likely to endanger the maintenance of international peace and security".
The
intervention, it was stated, included: the infiltration of armed bands
from Syria into Lebanon; the participation of United Arab Republic nationals
in acts of terrorism and rebellion against the established authorities
in Lebanon; the supply of arms from Syria to individuals and bands in Lebanon
rebelling against those authorities; and the waging of a violent radio
and press campaign in the United Arab Republic calling for the overthrow
of the established authorities in Lebanon.

On 27 May, the Security Council included the Lebanese complaint in its
agenda but postponed further consideration of the item until 3 June, as
the League of Arab States was to consider the matter on 31 May. After a
further postponement, in order to permit the Arab League to complete its
consideration of the matter, the Security Council began its discussion
on 6 June.

The majority of Security Council members expressed their concern at
what was termed the grave situation described by the Lebanese representative.
On 11 June the Security Council adopted
a resolution (S/4023) [ Chinese|French|
Russian],
submitted by the representative of Sweden, whereby the Council decided
"to
dispatch urgently an observation group to proceed to Lebanon so as to ensure
that there was no illegal infiltration of personnel or supply of arms or
other matériel across the Lebanese borders" and authorized the
Secretary-General to take the necessary steps to that end. The United
Nations Observation Group in Lebanon (UNOGIL) was thus created.

Until 9 December, when the United Nations Observation Group in Lebanon
officially ceased its operations, due to the re-establishement of cordial
and close relations between Lebanon and the United Arab Republic, the Observation
Group continued to develop its activities pursuant to the Council resolution
of 11 June.

The Second United Nations International Conference on the Peaceful Uses
of Atomic Energy was held in Geneva from 1 to 13 September. Preparations
for the Conference had been made over the previous two years, under Dag
Hammarskjöld's direction and with the expert assistance of the United
Nations Advisory Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy. The Conference
brought 2,700 delegates and advisers from 69 countries together to review
the uses of nuclear energy and to consider how it might be used most fruitfully
in the future. Over 4,600 abstracts and scientific papers were submitted.

On 16 October, the Secretary-General presented a report on the Conference
to the General Assembly, and stated that the conference gave "a synoptic
presentation of a vast and complicated area of science and technology and
thereby opened the door to a fruitful exchange of knowledge and ideas among
specialists in numerous scientific disciplines from many nations".
The report also included recommendations for the future, and a resolution
was adopted by the General Assembly based on this report. The resolution
continued the Advisory Committee with the same membership but with the
broader title of the United Nations Scientific Advisory Committee, and
provided that "henceforth it shall advise and assist the Secretary-General,
at his request, on all matters relating to the peaceful uses of atomic
energy with which the United Nations may be concerned."

After two years of trying, Dag Hammarskjöld finally secured acceptance
by the General Assembly of his proposal for an international administrative
service to supplement the technical assistance programme. On 14 November,
the General Assembly adopted five resolutions
[ Chinese|French|
Russian|
Spanish] that continued and developed the Expanded Programme by providing
operational or executive assistance to governments. Dag Hammarskjöld
described such assistance as being:
"the complete antithesis of anything
in the nature of a colonial arrangement."

In December, the Secretary-General travelled to the Middle East and
Africa. He spent Christmas with the United Nations Emergency Force, visiting
both Gaza and Sharm el Sheikh. He had talks in Cairo and Jerusalem. On
29 December, he was in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, to attend the opening of
the first session of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA). ECA had
been established during the 1958 spring session of the Economic and Social
Council as the fourth regional economic commission of the United Nations.
The Council had also decided that Addis Ababa would be the seat of the
Commission.

Unless otherwise
noted, the information included in these pages is based on the "Public
Papers of the Secretaries-General of the United Nations: Volumes II-V:
Dag Hammarskjöld", selected and edited with commentary by Andrew
W.Cordier and Wilder Foote, Columbia University Press, 1974-1975.